Guest Posted July 19, 2006 Posted July 19, 2006 My guy and I have been together for a while, about 18 months or so, though we've known each other a lot longer as we've had the same circle of friends for a long time. We're both in our late 30's and never married. We have a terrific relationship, love, passion, in love - all the good things. My problem is TIME. He's one of those guys who's really busy all the time, especially summer when he plays softball, does a lot of long-distance biking, and does all kinds of house maintenance on his place. His mom lives one state away, and he's always going up there to visit her and help her with her finances, house maintenance, etc. (his dad died years ago, so he's been wonderful about helping her out with stuff). I don't have any problem with him doing all this stuff, and in fact, a lot of those things are why I think he's so wonderful. But I'm also busy, so it doesn't leave us much time to actually be together. My solution to all this is to schedule our time together. I see it as our relationship is a priority, therefore, we should make time for it, put it on the schedule, and then plan our other stuff around it. His way of dealing with it is to squeeze us in when he's doesn't have other stuff scheduled. This makes me feel...less important, you know? Like, if he can plan around his commitment to his softball team every Thursday, why can't he do the same for our time together? Am I less important to him than softball? As I said, our relationship is great otherwise, and our time together is always wonderful...he's affectionate and attentive and everything else I could want. How do I bring this up without making him feel defensive or like I'm criticizing or that I want him to stop doing any of the those things he does? I just want us to see each other a bit more often...
threstofthat Posted July 19, 2006 Posted July 19, 2006 The way I figure, there are a few different things that can be going on in his head/reasons he's behaving this way. The first, and probably the most desirable, is that he just doesn't understand how much this is bothering you. You are important to him, the relationship is important to him, but he doesn't really have a problem with the current situation and you haven't explained to him how much it troubles you. The way to fix this situation is simply to talk to him about it a bit more, hopefully he'll be willing to change his scheduling routine and based on how you described him, I'd bet he would. The second choice is that he gets that you don't like it, but he doesn't care or at least doesn't care enough to change. In this situation the relationship could be in trouble. If he thinks that the relationship is less important than softball... well we all know that's bad. There isn't a whole lot you can do in this situation other than try to get him to change his attitude or just deal with it. As I said, I can't tell you what he's thinking, but if I had to guess, it's #1. Frequently women think that men understand something they're feeling when they really don't have the slightest clue. Over-explination is better than not enough, so make sure he understands how you're feeling about the lack of time together and go from there.
norajane Posted July 20, 2006 Posted July 20, 2006 It can be hard to talk to guys about wanting to see them more often...they compartmentalize their lives so much. If they're at all commitment-phobic, telling them you want more time together can send them right into "she's too clingy/needy" land and then they want to withdraw. My suggestion is to pose it as a question, or something that you figure out together. Maybe when you see each other and he says he had a great time, you can say, "I had a really great time, too. Let's figure out how we can do this more often" or "what can we do to squeeze in more of these visits?"
Kengne Posted July 20, 2006 Posted July 20, 2006 My suggestion is to pose it as a question, or something that you figure out together. Maybe when you see each other and he says he had a great time, you can say, "I had a really great time, too. Let's figure out how we can do this more often" or "what can we do to squeeze in more of these visits?" Good idea, because men love to 'fix' things and be the one to find the solution. Def you do not want it to come off as if you are unhappy with him. Just be positive & appreciative, and I'm sure he'll gladly make more time for you two. K.
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